Our Work

With rigorous economic research and practical policy solutions, we focus on the issues and institutions that are critical to global development. Explore our core themes and topics to learn more about our work.

Search By

Commentary & Analysis

In timely and incisive analysis, our experts parse the latest development news and devise practical solutions to new and emerging challenges. Our events convene the top thinkers and doers in global development.

You are here

Donald Kaberuka

Topics:

Expertise

Finance and development; multilateral banking

Bio

Donald Kaberuka, former president of the African Development Bank Group, is a CGD distinguished visiting fellow and member of the board of directors. He is also the Hauser Leader-in-Residence at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.

During his tenure as president of the African Development Bank, Kaberuka bolstered its franchise value, tripled its capital from USD 30 billion to USD 100 billion, and doubled the bank’s portfolio. Kaberuka’s leadership was particularly characterized by a "big push” on the private sector and leading from the front on infrastructure. He championed an inclusive growth agenda; promoted a strong link between security, development and the environment, establishing a ring-fenced facility for conflict affected countries; and appointed an international high-level panel on fragile states led by President Johnson Sirleaf of Liberia. He put in place an Africa Natural Resource Center and the African Legal Support Facility to provide support to African countries managing natural resource wealth.

Before becoming finance minister of Rwanda, Kaberuka worked in the private sector in the commodities business, including a term as chief economist of the Inter-African Coffee Organization. Kaberuka also served as governor for Rwanda for the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank from 1997 to 2005. His private interests include classical music and wildlife conservation. Kaberuka currently serves on the board of trustees of the World Economic Forum, the Mandela Institute (Minds), and the Mo Ibrahim Foundation. He is also a member of several international panels on finance and development.

Kaberuka is an alumnus of the University of Glasgow in Scotland and has been a Visiting Fellow at the Institute of Development Studies of Sussex University in England.

More From Donald Kaberuka

The Center for Global Development and the LSE-Oxford Commission on State Fragility, Growth and Development will co-host a conversation with David Cameron, former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Donald Kaberuka, High Representative on the African Union Peace Fund, distinguished visiting fellow at CGD, and former President of the African Development Bank, and Jennifer Widner, professor of Politics and International Affairs at Princeton University and a member of the Commission on State Fragility, Growth and Development, to discuss the need for a new global approach to state fragility. The Fragility Commission, which Cameron and Kaberuka chair, will be launching its report, Escaping the Fragility Trap, which makes the case for urgent action and outlines recommendations for how domestic and international actors can do things differently.

The African Development Bank is widely praised these days as one of the premier financial institutions in Africa. The past decade saw it place much greater emphasis on infrastructure financing, a change brought about in part by the instincts of its former president Donald Kaberuka. In this week's podcast, Kaberuka discusses how the AfDB’s success came about.

Kaberuka is currently a Hauser Leader-in-Residence at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. At CGD he will be working on finance and development issues, including serving as a member of our High-Level Panel on Multilateral Banking, which will issue its report in the coming months.

The African Development Bank is widely praised these days as one of the premier financial institutions in Africa. The past decade saw it place much greater emphasis on infrastructure financing, a change brought about in part by the instincts of its former president Donald Kaberuka. In this week's podcast, Kaberuka discusses how the AfDB’s success came about.

Kaberuka is currently a Hauser Leader-in-Residence at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University. At CGD he will be working on finance and development issues, including serving as a member of our High-Level Panel on Multilateral Banking, which will issue its report in the coming months.